474 PLANNER - 2008 RSS Feeds and Its Implementation at INFLIBNET Rajeev Kumar
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474 PLANNER - 2008 RSS Feeds and its Implementation at INFLIBNET Rajeev Kumar Abstract RSS is a Web 2.0 technology that is being used by millions of web users around the world to keep track of their favourite websites. In the ‘old days’ of the web to keep track of updates on a website visitors had to ‘bookmark’ websites in their browser and manually return to them on a regular basis to see what had been added. RSS has become a valuable technology for everything from casual web users to webmasters. According to a recent Yahoo survey only 12% of internet users are aware of RSS and a mere 4% have knowingly used RSS. The paper discusses about the different aspects of RSS such as meaning of RSS, evolution of RSS, how to create RSS and how to get / read RSS Feeds including basics of XML, which is the basic language for writing programs for RSS Feeds. At the end of this paper, details of the project about the INFLIBNET’s RSS Reader is also discussed. Keywords : RSS, Feed, RSS Reader, Aggregator, XML. 1. Introduction In the present age of Internet and rapid changing web technology, it is almost impossible to visit the website these days without seeing the mention of RSS or icons pointing to RSS resources. RSS is most commonly used on news sites and blogs. It is one of important advertising tools about the new products and informing latest research papers in a journal. Visitor can be updated as soon as new content is added. RSS (Really Simple Syndication) is a method of delivering web content to users that does not necessarily require a web browser. In technical words, RSS is an XML-based format for content distribution. Webmasters create an RSS file containing headlines and descriptions of specific information. While the majority of RSS feeds currently contain news headlines or breaking information, the scope of long term uses of RSS are broad. RSS is a defined standard based on XML with the specific purpose of delivering updates to web-based content. Using this standard, webmasters provide headlines and fresh content in a succinct manner. RSS Reader, a program to see the result of feeds, is very important. Visitors use RSS Readers or RSS Aggregators to collect and monitor their desired / favourite feeds in one centralized program or location. Content viewed in the RSS Reader or RSS Aggregator is known as an RSS feed. 2. What is RSS? RSS stands for more than one thing. Usually, RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication”. But it can also mean “Rich Site Summary” or “RDF Site Summary”, where RDF stands for “Resource Description Framework.” RDF Site Summary is the first version of RSS created in March 1999. This version became known as RSS 0.9. In July 1999, a new version RSS 0.91 was produced and renamed RSS as “Rich Site Summary”. A new version RSS 2.0 was released in September 2002 and now RSS became Really Simple Syndication. 6th Convention PLANNER - 2008, Nagaland University, Nagaland, November 06-07, 2008 © INFLIBNET Centre, Ahmedabad 475 The technical acronym for RSS is “Really Simple Syndication”, an XML format that is created to syndicate news, and be a means to share content on the web. Wikipedia defines RSS as follows: “RSS is a family of Web feed formats used to publish frequently updated works such as blog entries, news headlines, audio, and video in a standardized format. An RSS document (which is called a “feed,” “web feed,” or “channel”) includes full or summarized text plus metadata such as publishing dates and authorship. Web feeds benefit publishers by letting them syndicate works quickly and automatically. They benefit readers who want to subscribe to timely updates from favoured websites or to aggregate feeds from many sites into one place.” 3. How to Read RSS Feeds RSS Feeds are read using RSS Reader. RSS Reader, which is also termed as Feed Reader or RSS Aggregator, is a software which can be web based or desktop based. The user subscribes to a feed by entering the feed’s link into the Reader by clicking an RSS icon in a browser that initiates the subscription process. The RSS Reader checks the user’s subscribed feeds regularly for new work, downloads any updates that it finds and provides a user interface to monitor and read the feeds. There are many feed readers going around with a variety of approaches and features. Some the them are freely available, some are purchasable. Some work as web services and some are limited to Windows or Linux platform. However a good place to start is with a couple of free and easy to use web based one like Google Reader and Bloglines. In the table -1 and 2 given below, list of some RSS Reader for Windows / Linux platforms are given. Now-a-days some browsers have also built-in RSS Reading facility such as Mozilla, IneternetExplorer7. In these browsers, after typing the URL of the RSS Link, one can get the feed. Table – 1 : RSS Reader for Windows Platform Sl. No. RSS Reader Source 1. Awasu http://www.awasu.com 2. EffNews http://www.effbot.org/zone/effnews-exe.htm 3. FeedReader http://www.feedreader.com 4. InfoSnorkel http://www.blueelephantsoftware.com/ rss_aggregator.htm 5. NewzSpider http://www.newzspider.com/ 6. RSS Captor Pro http://www.rsscaptor.com 7. RSSReader http://www.rssreader.com 8. SharpReader http://sharpreader.com 9. SurfPack http://www.surfpack.com 10. Syndirella http://www.yole.ru/projects/syndirella/ 476 Table – 2 : RSS Reader for Linux Platform Sl. No. RSS Reader Source 1. Bottom Feeder http://www.cincomsmalltalk.com/ BottomFeeder/ 2. Composite http://www.jelovic.com/rssaggregator/ 3. Eclipse RSS Reader http://morphine.sourceforge.net/ presence/projects/rss/index.html 4. K.R.S.S. http://krss.sourceforge.net/ 5. Liferea http://liferea.sourceforge.net 6. Mozilla Thunderbird http://www.mozilla.com/thunderbird/ 7. Straw http://www.nongnu.org/straw/ 8. Syndigator http://syndigator.sourceforge.net 4. Benefits of RSS 4.1 Benefit to Webmasters As the web has become more crowded, webmasters have been striving to provide fresh and up to date content for their website visitors. Many webmasters have discovered they can easily utilize the information in RSS feeds to provide fresh web content. As discussed earlier, RSS feeds are composed in XML, which is a very simple markup language. Similar to HTML, XML uses tags to identify fields. Webmasters can easily parse the RSS feed and dynamically create web pages that contain headlines and summaries. The feeds will continuously update, supplying a steady stream of automatically generated fresh content. RSS allows webmasters to: 1.) Provide fresh and relevant content on their website, which encourages users to return. 2.) Constantly changing content means that search engine spiders will visit more frequently. 3.) Automate content delivery. The benefits of RSS feeds are not limited to webmasters, surfers too benefit from the technology as well. 4.2 Benefit to Web Surfers The beauty of RSS is that readers can quickly scan headlines (titles) and read articles of interest. Because the information is condensed and provided in a single location users can generally review more information in a shorter time frame. Additional information is only a click away. Best of all readers choose the feeds they wish to see, there is no spam with RSS. If one is not completely thrilled with the content appearing in a feed, simply it can be removed from the newsreader. The 477 technology is a pull technology rather than push technology, meaning the content is not forced on the consumers, who pull the content they want to see. RSS allows for users to: 1.) Easily locate information. 2.) Read condensced information or ‘soundbytes’ with clearly marked and dated topic material. 3.) Classify and categorize information in an easy to navigate manner. 4.) Maximize their time without having to deal with spam. RSS feeds can be viewed in a news aggregator or reader, which constantly updates and shows unread feeds. It is found the functionality of the newsreaders to be similar to a simple email client. Consumers generally enter the URL of any RSS feeds that interest them. Topics with a common theme can be segregated into related groups. 4.3 Benefit to Content Developer While the benefits to users and webmasters are clear the distribution opportunities made available to content developers should not be overlooked. Information contained in the RSS feed can be easily syndicated, increasing content distribution and reach. RSS allows for content developers to: 1.) Increase exposure in niche markets. 2.) Communicate with user bases and reach potential customers via an alternate communication method. 3.) Disseminate relevant information. 4.) Define themselves as an industry expert. 5.) Automate content delivery. RSS has effectively standardized the format for content delivery and has effectively defined the accepted standard for content distribution and syndication. RSS will likely rival email as a means of content distribution in another few years. The shear simplicity makes the technology very appealing. The distribution potential, while albeit difficult to measure, is still attractive to all parties making the likelihood that RSS popularity will only continue to grow. 5. Creating Rss Feeds RSS Feeds are created using XML format. Hence to cerate one’s own RSS Feeds to be delivered through website, knowledge of XML is must. XML is a markup language much like HTML. In the next subsections, we will try to understand how to write XML codes for RSS Feeds. However there are several RSS Feed creation software also available, for which knowledge XML programming is not needed.